WHY DO YOU LIKE AND COLLECT MATCHES?
I’m a food lover and when I travel or have time to myself, I like to explore a new place gastronomically. You can’t take the food home with you as a souvenir, so it’s nice to have a tangible item to remember the meal. There seems to be a cultural moment happening right now where the “pictures of your food” are starting to get tiresome, but people are going to want something as a way of saying “I ate here” or “I stayed in this hotel.” Kind of like having a passport for the hospitality industry. I think we’re about to see a surge of places that start to carry them.
WHAT ARE YOUR FAVORITE ONES AND WHY?
There’s a funny story behind my @thepolobar matches. My friend Madison is also a match collector, and sometimes we plan dates to pick up matches at spots we know offer them. As for the Polo Bar matches — we thought they were an urban legend because they were so hard to acquire and it seemed that they once existed but then they stopped making them. Every time we visited the restaurant, we struck out when it came to the matches. A few months ago we went back to the Polo Bar, and we figured let’s ask one more time. Our server managed to dig some up from who knows where and brought us a handful. The matchbox itself is pretty standard, but it’s a happy memory for me.
WHEN AND HOW DO YOU LIKE TO ENJOY YOUR MATCHES?
I have a rule that I can only pick up a matchbox if I have a drink or a meal at the spot (exception for vintage boxes and books!) So, I always enjoy my matches while having a great meal or drink. I never use them to light my candles, but I do scatter them around my home to decorate. Eventually, I want to get a large glass vase to house them, but for now, they happily live in little jars around my apartment.
